Nutcracker blues

Well, the idiots in management and on the board at Washington Ballet, who locked out the dancers last week over a safe working conditions dispute, basically thumbed their noses at the dancers and their patrons, and canceled the rest of their Nutcracker run. This is not the first time the company has had labor problems over board policies, working conditions, and relationships with artistic director Septime Weber. The Nutcracker is the major money maker for most ballet companies in the country, a money maker that allows them to do their other works during the course of the year. Washington Ballet's run only lasted half the scheduled time, and they will have cancellation costs for the Warner Theater and the contracted orchestra musicians for the final two weeks, so that will eat up any profit they might have had from the first half of the run. Sadly, it also puts the remainder of the season in peril and it bodes poorly for the continuing viability of this ballet company in future seasons.

Heavy handed anti-union techniques may be appropriate for industrial-type labor, but it is incredibly shortsighted and inappropriate in the non-profit arts arena. I have been saddened at all of the labor disputes I've personally witnessed around the country during the past decade or so where the boards (who are supposed to be trustees for the public interest) have shut down orchestras and dance companies, rather than working with the artists to resolve concerns, impoverishing all of us and killing the fine arts in the parts of the country which need them most. Arts organization board members need to start doing their jobs and stop treating their groups as social occasions and opportunities for cocktail parties.

Classical musicians and dancers are highly educated professionals, many with graduate degrees, who deserve a living wage and safe working conditions. Having company management tell the press when dancers complain about a sharp increase in injuries during a rehearsal period that injury rates are "consistent with average injury rates at other companies" is not the sort of thing you want known by people like me who've been plaintiffs' personal injury attorneys! And it certainly isn't good public relations to show patrons how little management respects dancers.

So, having passed up an opportunity to see Nutcracker danced earlier this month at the Kennedy Center by the better American Ballet Theater from New York City, I'm a bit miffed at Washington Ballet's board and management. I was wanting my limited entertainment dollars to support a local group instead of a well-funded national company, and I was also curious to see Washington Ballet's "Washingtonized" production, re-imagined and set in Georgetown. Alas, the company will probably fold now, and I'll never get to see it.

---

I'm not going without my annual Nutcracker fix, however, as we went this afternoon to the closing performance of the Bartlesville Civic Ballet in Marie Foster Hall at the Taliesin West/Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation-designed Bartlesville Community Center (in the shadow of the Price Tower, Wright's only skyscraper). It's a bit of a nostalgic journey for me, since this is the company where I made my dance debut decades ago in Graduation Ball, and balletmistress "Miss Charlotte" is still imperiously presiding over the company!

There is a certain charm to watching a civic ballet. Since we're looking at kids and students instead of professionals, we can appreciate a performance for its sweetness and for unexpected gems, rather than watching with a hypercritical eye for perfect dance technique and brilliantly innovative choreography. Bartlesville has always had a good company, and they draw dancers from other nearby small cities. Miss Charlotte also invites back a few of her former dancers once they've gone off to college, and had a half dozen young women and one very handsome young man (and, wow, has he grown up since I last saw him dance!) to serve as soloists for this production; the better high school-aged dancers are demi-soloists.

The prima ballerina and premier danseur for this production were guest artists Mary Elizabeth Arrington from City Ballet of Houston (formerly of Tulsa Ballet) and Domingo Rubio formerly of Ballet Hispanico of New York, Joffrey-Chicago, and the National Dance Company of Mexico, dancing the snow queen and king, the sugar plum fairy, and the cavalier.

As usual, the kindergartener-aged kids as baby mice and as angels stole the show. Never discount the "ah" factor! I was holding my breath during the dance of the snowflakes because the tech people had fake snow falling in pooled "blizzards" on the stage, right where some of the women were not only dancing en pointe, but were doing pirouhettes and leaps, and I just knew someone was going to fall and break a leg! All was well, though, and it was a very successful afternoon, even with all the sleepy and tired pre-schoolers in the audience who did just fine for act one, but got cranky before the end of act two.

Of course, the highlight for me for the afternoon was seeing all the cute young daddies in the audience sitting with their children. Some of them were so cute (and I don't mean the kids)!

I probably should have stuck around for the post-performance reception to say hi to Miss Charlotte, but we decided to escape while we could to avoid the traffic (traffic being a relative term in Bartlesville) since we somehow managed to be amongst the first out of the auditorium. Just as well. I'm not feeling social today.